SQUIRREL

squirrel

What do you know about this cute little animals?

Squirrel's belong to the order "Rodent", with 1650 species, it is the largest group of living mammals.  It also comprises forty percent of all present day mammal species.

There are over 365 species of squirrels in seven families. They include the tree squirrel, ground squirrel, and flying squirrel. Plus many squirrel-like mammals such as the gopher, ground hog and prairie dog.

Squirrels are the most active in late winter,  when the mating season begins.   The males will chase a females, as well as, chase off other suitors. This ritual of chasing, occurs through the trees at top speed.  While they perform some of the most breathtaking acrobatics imaginable.

The period of gestation varies from 33 days in the smaller species of pine squirrels, up to 60 days for the larger species such as the common gray and fox squirrels.

Squirrels are usually born in the early spring. The average litter consists of four. This varies with climate and location.  A second litter can occur in mid summer,  if there is an adequate food supply.

A female squirrel will choose the strongest male during mating season, but is unlikely to breed with that male again. This is natures way of reducing inbreeding,  and to preserve the species.

A baby squirrel weighs approximately one ounce at birth,  and is about one inch long. They do not have hair or teeth, and are virtually blind for the first six to eight weeks.

Gray squirrels come in many colors.  Shades of gray are the most common followed by shades of brown. There are also pure white and pure black squirrels,  but both are variations of the gray squirrel.

The common Red squirrel can have an all black coat.  While the Kaaba squirrel has a black body with a white tail. Both are found in coniferous forests.

In the summer squirrels are most active two to three hours after sunrise, then they'll rest in the afternoon. Resuming activity again two hours before sunset. The squirrel will retire to its nest well before dark,  and will rarely leave the nest in the dark.   In the winter, the squirrel will complete its activities between dawn and mid- day, and will remain in or around the nest until the next day.

During winter storms, or severe cold, the squirrel may not leave the nest for days.   But,  the tree squirrel does not hibernate!

An adult squirrel normally lives alone. But will, in severe cold, share its nest with other squirrels to conserve body heat. Once the temperature rises, the guests will be on their way.

Squirrels eyes are located high, and on each side of their head.  This allows them a wide field of vision, without turning their head.

The gray squirrels diet consists of nuts, seeds and fruit. It will eat bird eggs, bugs, and even an animal carcass if there is no other food source available.

The gray squirrel requires some salt in its diet, and may find this salt in the soil along roads where snow and ice may have been.

Squirrels chew on tree branches to sharpen and clean their teeth. That's why you may see many small branches on the ground around large trees. They will also chew on power lines for the same reason, this has caused many major power outages throughout the country.

A squirrel's brain is about the size of a walnut.

The average adult squirrel needs to eat about a pound of food a week to maintain an active life.

Squirrels communicate through a series of chirps. The frequency,  and the duration of the notes communicate everything from laughter to alarm. Their frequency range is normally between .01 KHz. and 10 KHz. (kilohertz). These sounds when used in conjunction with tail gestures, form the basis for squirrel  communication.

If a squirrel has taken up residence in your attic or crawl space, the only practical way to remove them is by trapping.

A squirrel will break the shell of a nut with its teeth, then clean the nut by licking it or rubbing on its face before it is buried. This action applies a scent to the nut which helps the squirrel find it later, even under a foot of snow.

The sweat glands of a tree squirrel are located on their feet, between the foot pads and on their paws between the toes. When hot or excited a squirrel will leave wet tracks on a dry surface. This scent is also used to mark the trees in their territory.

If a squirrels nest becomes infested with fleas or other parasites, it will move to, or build a new nest. This is why there may be more nests then squirrels in a given area.

The gray squirrel has been known to build a nest in many unusual places, in an attic or a crawl space seems to be the most common. Squirrels have also built nests in automobiles, chimney's, barbecue grills and under porches.

When a squirrel senses danger, its first instinct is to stand motionless. If on the ground it will race to the closest tree, or other climbable object to escape. If it is in a tree, it will circle the trunk with its body pressed tightly to the bark.

The squirrel's erratic path while crossing a street is an attempt to confuse the oncoming vehicle... thereby causing it to change direction. This is obliviously the squirrels biggest, and often last mistake.

The male tree squirrel takes twice as long, as the female, to groom itself. They are the cleanest animal in the rodent family.

A squirrels teeth grow continuously. Their incisor's will grow six inches per year, but stay short due to the constant wear they receive.

The most common type of squirrel bite is a result of feeding a squirrel by hand. Never hold the food between your fingers, chances are very good you will be bitten. A squirrel's eyes are always looking for predators and they rarely focus on what they are eating.

Elephant

 The story of the elephant.

Elephants typically reach puberty at thirteen or fourteen years of age
They have offspring up until they are around fifty years old
They may live seventy years or possibly more
A cow produces a single calf and in very rare cases twins
The interval between births is between two and a half to four years
An elephant´s trunk, a union of the nose and upper lip, is a highly sensitive organ with over 100,000 muscle units.

Elephant trunks can get very heavy. It is not uncommon to see elephants resting them over a tusk!
Elephants cry, play, have incredible memories, and laugh!
Elephants are sensitive fellow animals where if a baby complains, the entire family will rumble and go over to touch and caress it.
Elephants have greeting ceremonies when a friend that has been away for some time returns to the group.
Elephants grieve at a loss of a stillborn baby, a family member, and in many cases other elephants.
Elephants don't drink with their trunks, but use them as "tools" to drink with. This is accomplished by filling the trunk with water and then using it as a hose to pour it into the elephant's mouth.
Interestingly, the Asian elephant is more closely related to the extinct mammoth than to the African elephant.

It seems inevitable that as long as we humans impose our own theories on how to best govern nature, there will be a difference of opinion of "animal" management. Over the course of evolution, the elephant as we know it today has evolved into a strong forced bulldozer that has the power to modify the landscape it resides in. For elephants their effect on the landscape is often considered destruction, but is it?

The answer to this question partially depends on your preconceived views of "nature". If you see nature as something static and in a particular way then any change no matter how minute will amount to destruction. An interesting statistic found in the book African Elephants: A Celebration of Majesty about this issue; a general estimation shows that Man is clearing more forests in one day that all the elephants in Africa will 'destroy' within one year. Put in perspective, the effect that elephants have on their environment may not be as serious are we have been led to believe.

Unfortunately for some, our narrow opinion of seeing elephants as only living bulldozers of destruction is far from the case. As much as 80 percent of what elephants consume is returned to the soil as barely digested highly fertile manure.
 Elephants provide a vital role in the ecosystem they inhabit.

They modify their habitat by converting savannah and woodlands to grasslands
Elephants can provide water for other species by digging water holes in dry riverbeds
the depressions created by their footprints and their bodies trap rainfall
Elephants act as seed dispersers by their fecal matter. It is often carried below ground by dung beetles and termites causing the soil to become more aerated and further distributing the nutrients
Their paths act as firebreaks and rain water conduits
An Elephants journey through the high grass provides food for birds by disturbing small reptiles, amphibians or insects.

In the tradition of elephant sites, we have provided a breakdown of elephants into two categories for basic physical statistics. Keep in mind that the two "groups" are quite different genetically and the Asian elephant (as noted) is actually more closely related to the extinct mammoth than the African elephant.

The Asian elephant, Elephants Maxi mus, has an enormous domed head with relatively small ears, an arched back and a single finger like protuberance that is located at the tip of the trunk. An Asian elephant has five toes on the front of the feet and and four on the back. 
A large bull could typically weighs six tons and is ten feet high at the shoulder. As with gorillas, there is a large degree of sexual dimorphism between males and females in Asian Elephants where adult females are about half the size of the largest males. 
The males have tusks and the females have 'tushes', which are shore second incisors that just stick out beyond the upper lip. However, it is important to note that on occasion females some times have longer tushes than described.
The gestation period is between nineteen and twenty-two months. Periodically, it is noted that male infants typically have a slightly longer term than females. 

The African elephant, Periodontal Africans, have a straight back, enormous ears, and two trunk 'fingers'.

2fingerscloseupAfrican elephants are named for the peculiar shaped ridges of their molar teeth; the ridges of an African elephant's teeth are coarser and fewer than those of the Asian elephant.

The African elephant has only four toes on the front feet and three on the back. Interestingly, it has one more vertebra in the lumbar section of the spine.

Both sexes have tusks, and they are also larger in size as compared to male and female Asian elephants.

The largest African elephant recorded weighed over nine tons and stood more than twelve feet high at the shoulder. As in Asian elephants, the female African elephant is generally half the size of a fully grown male.

Gestation period tends to be slightly longer than in the Asian elephant.

TURTLE

turtle

DESPITE WEAKNESSES THAT IS HIDDEN STORY GREATNESS.

Management Lesson from an age-old tale

1. Once upon a time a tortoise and a hare had an argument about who

was faster. They decided to settle the argument with a race. They

agreed on a route and started off the race. The hare shot ahead and

ran briskly for some time. Then seeing that he was far ahead of the

tortoise, he thought he'd sit under a tree for some time and relax

before continuing the race. He sat under the tree and soon fell

asleep. The tortoise plodding on overtook him and soon finished the

race, emerging as the undisputed champ. The hare woke up and realized

that he'd lost the race.

The moral of the story is that slow and steady wins the race. This is

the version of the story that we've all grown up with.

2. But then recently, someone told a more interesting version of

this story. It continues............

The hare was disappointed at losing the race and he did some

soul-searching. He realized that he'd lost the race only because he

had been overconfident, careless and lax. If he had not taken things

for granted, there's no way the tortoise could have beaten him. So he

challenged the tortoise to another race. The tortoise agreed. This

time, the hare went all out and ran without stopping from start to

finish. He won by several miles.

The moral of the story?

Fast and consistent will always beat the slow and steady. If you have

two people in your organization, one slow, methodical and reliable,

and the other fast and still reliable at what he does, the fast and

reliable chap will consistently climb the organizational ladder

faster than the slow, methodical chap.

It's good to be slow and steady; but it's better to be fast and reliable.

3. But the story doesn't end here. The tortoise did some thinking

this time, and realized that there's no way he can beat the hare in a

race the way it was currently formatted. He thought for a while, and

then challenged the hare to another race, but on a slightly

different route.

The hare agreed. They started off. In keeping with his self-made

commitment to be consistently fast, the hare took off and ran at top

speed until he came to a broad river. The finishing line was a couple

of kilometers on the other side of the river.

The hare sat there wondering what to do. In the meantime the tortoise

trundled along, got into the river, swam to the opposite bank,

continued walking and finished the race.

The moral of the story? First identify your core competency and then

change the playing field to suit your core competency.

In an organization, if you are a good speaker, make sure you create

opportunities to give presentations that enable the senior management

to notice you.

If your strength is analysis, make sure you do some sort of research,

make a report and send it upstairs. Working to your strengths will

not only get you noticed, but will also create opportunities for

growth and advancement.

The story still hasn't ended.

4. The hare and the tortoise, by this time, had become pretty good

friends and they did some thinking together. Both realized that the

last race could have been run much better. So they decided to do the

last race again, but to run as a team this time.

They started off, and this time the hare carried the tortoise till

the riverbank. There, the tortoise took over and swam across with the

hare on his back. On the opposite bank, the hare again carried the

tortoise and they reached the finishing line together. They both felt

a greater sense of

satisfaction than they'd felt earlier.

The moral of the story? It's good to be individually brilliant and to

have strong core competencies; but unless you're able to work in a

team! and harness each others core competencies, you'll always

perform below par because there will always be situations at which

you'll do poorly and someone else does well.

Teamwork is mainly about situational leadership, letting the person

with the relevant core competency for a situation take leadership.

There are more lessons to be learn from this story.:

ANALYSIS.

Note that neither the hare nor the tortoise gave up after failures.

The hare decided to work harder and put in more effort after his failure.

The tortoise changed his strategy because he was already working as

hard as he could. In life, when faced with failure, sometimes it is

appropriate to work harder and put in more effort. Sometimes it is

appropriate to change strategy and try something different. And

sometimes it is appropriate to do both.

The hare and the tortoise also learn another vital lesson. When we

stop competing against a rival and instead start competing against

the situation, we perform far better.

When Roberto Ghettoize took over as CEO of Coca-Cola in the 1980s, he

was faced with intense competition from Pepsi that was eating into

Coke's growth. His executives were Pepsi-focussed and intent on

increasing market share 0.1 per cent a time.

Ghettoize decided to stop competing against Pepsi and instead compete

against the situation of 0.1 per cent growth.

He asked his executives what was the average fluid intake of an

American per day? The answer was 14 ounces. What was Coke's share of

that? Two ounces. Ghettoize said Coke needed a larger share of that

market. The competition wasn't Pepsi. It was the water, tea, coffee,

milk and fruit juices that went into the remaining 12 ounces. The

public should reach for a Coke whenever they felt like drinking

something.

To this end, Coke put up vending machines at every street corner.

Sales took a quantum jump and Pepsi has never quite caught up since.

To sum up, the story of the hare and tortoise teaches us many things.

Chief among them are that fast and consistent will always beat slow

and steady; work to your competencies; pooling resources and working

as a team will always beat individual performers; never give up when

faced with failure; and finally, compete against the situation ? not

against a rival,

it's just a story, do you know about turtles?

turtle a reptile of the order Echelon, with strong, beaked, toothless jaws and, usually, an armor like shell. The shell normally consists of bony plates overlaid with horny shields. The upper portion, or carapace, covers the turtle's back and sides, and the lower portion, or periastron, covers the belly; the two parts are joined at the sides. Exceptions are the rare platelets turtles of New Guinea and the marine leather back turtle, which is encased in a thick, ossified skin resembling a carapace. When startled, most turtles withdraw their heads straight back into their shells, the neck folding into an S-shaped curve. However, in the side-necked turtles of the Southern Hemisphere, the head moves sideways and tucks next to the shoulder.

Turtles are found throughout most of the temperate and tropical world and in the open ocean; of the 270 known species, 42% are rare or threatened with extinction. Many turtles and their eggs are valued as food. Edible species include several marine turtles, the green turtle (traditional ingredient of turtle soup), the diamondback terrapin, and the soft-shelled turtles. Catching females when they lay eggs on land has contributed to a serious decline in many species, since it can take 10 to 30 years for some turtles to reach sexual maturity.

Different types of turtle are variously adapted to living on land, in freshwater, or in the ocean, but all turtles breathe by means of lungs (though some freshwater turtles also can absorb oxygen from the water through their skin or other means), and all lay eggs on land. The land-living species, especially those of the family Attitudinize, are commonly called tortoises. The name terrapin is generally applied to large freshwater or brackish water species, especially those used for food. Turtle species are either herbivorous or carnivorous but rarely both. They range in length from a few inches to over 6 ft (2 m), most being between 5 in. and 15 in. (13–38 cm) long. Many specimens have survived more than 50 years in captivity; one giant tortoise is known to have lived for 176 years, and another is believed to have lived about 250 years. Even larger giant turtles, some 8 ft (2.5 m) in length, lived c.3,000 years ago in the Pacific on Fate island, Vanuatu, dying out after the arrival of humans there. The largest known fossil turtle, Echelon crisscross, a sea turtle that lived during the late Cretaceous, was 15 ft (4.5 m) long.

Turtles existed 200 million years ago, at the time of the earliest dinosaurs; these early land-dwelling turtles could not retract their necks. By 120 million years ago some turtles had adapted to an aquatic life, although a 220-million-year-old ancestor of turtles that had only a bony breastplate may have been aquatic. Many of the living families of turtles existed in the Cretaceous period and have undergone very little change since then. On the basis of morphological (body structure) evidence, turtles were thought to be the oldest surviving group of reptiles. However, molecular studies comparing genes in different reptile groups indicate that turtles, along with crocodiles, are the most modern of reptiles.

Types of Turtles

Turtles are classified in 12 families. The Northern Hemisphere's largest family is that of common freshwater turtles (Chlamydiae), which includes about a third of all turtle species and is abundant in S and E Asia, E North America, and Central America. Members of this group have webbed feet; many spend most of the time in freshwater ponds or marshes; some live in brackish estuaries. They include such well-known North American turtles as the pond turtles (including the spotted, wood, and Ehrenberg's turtles), the painted turtle, the sliders, the diamondback terrapin, and the Landing's turtle. The box turtle, which is primarily terrestrial, belongs to this family. Land tortoises (Attitudinize) form the second largest family. Tortoises have high-domed shells, move on club-shaped feet, are vegetarian, and live in warm regions throughout the world. The musk turtles and mud turtles (family Paternoster) are common small turtles of the E United States, and are found only in the Americas. The soft-shelled turtles (family Trichinae) are flat-bodied, carnivorous freshwater turtles of the Northern Hemisphere, with a leathery covering instead of horny shields on their shells. The snapping turtle family (Cherida) is a North American group that includes the common snapper and the alligator snapper.

Marine turtles are classified in two families. The family Cannelloni includes five sea turtle species of tropical and subtropical distribution: the green turtle, the loggerhead, the hawks bill (or tortoiseshell turtle), the Kemp's riddle, and the olive riddle. The family Thermochemical includes only one species, the leather back, or leatherneck, largest and heaviest of all turtles, weighing as much as 1100 lbs (500 kg). Marine turtles lack toes, and their legs are warlike, allowing speeds of nearly 20 mph (32 kph) in the water. With the exception of the loggerhead, all are endangered, either by pollution with plastic debris, which some turtles eat by mistake, or by commercial fishing, especially shrimp trawling. Commercial trade in all endangered sea turtles is banned; however, many wild turtles are skinned for leather and tortoiseshell ornaments, or taken for food.